Astral Plane Geographic Location in Lands of Erdos | World Anvil
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Astral Plane

The astral plane, also called the astral sea, is a bright—but never blinding—infinite void of purple and silver mist. It is the primary plane of existence of the Empyreal Universe but it also touches regions of the Physical and Fundamental universes.  The astral sea is timeless in the sense that even though time passes normally, entropy does not hold sway here. While in this plane of existence you cease to age, and you never go hungry or thirsty—though tiredness still remains a thing and thus one still needs rest. Creatures traverse the astral plane by thought alone. The plane is always relatively warm, and there is always breathable air (or creatures are tricked into thinking they are breathing in the spiritual plane of thought).  

Geographical Features

The most important thing one has to note about the features of the astral sea, is that they are always moving in a way that is not compatible with common sense. If we assumed there was a north in the astral plane and you had a compass that worked there, a location you visited yesterday to the east and took you 5 hours to reach, today it might be to the west and require 10 hours to reach.   This fact notwithstanding, you can never really get lost in the astral sea because all entities that enter or live in this plane are blessed with directional awareness. In other words, a creature can get to where it wants to go by thinking of its destination, at which point it becomes aware of the most direct route to that location. And no matter where in the astral sea you are, it rarely takes extremely long to reach your destination even though, again, a place that took you a day to reach before, might take you a month the next.  

Color Pools

The most common phenomenon of the astral plane, are the color pools. Each one is a portal to a location in another plane of existence in any of the three universes. Color pools blink in and out of existence and because of that they are the only thing you cannot reliably reach using the plane’s mystical directional awareness. You might want to reach a color pool that leads to the City of Brass, but as the pool you are trying to reach blinks out of existence, you are redirected to another one, and before you reach it that one blinks out and you are redirected. Conceivably, depending on your luck, you may never be able to reach the color pool you need.  

Astral Dominions

Then there are Astral Dominions, vast demesnes usually created by deities. Astral Dominions used by gods often have permanent portals that lead to their domains in the Outer Planes.  

Dead Gods

The astral sea is a testament to the fact that deities can die. When a god dies, part of its dead essence materializes in the astral sea as an enormous rocky husk. These godscorpses are often appropriated my other creatures and turned into settlements. The githyanki city of Tu’narath is a notable example of this.  

The Astral Shores of the Outer Planes

The first layer of each outer plane of the Empyreal Universe connects to the astral sea. These astral shores can be as inviting or hostile as the plane they connect to.  

Wildspace Regions

From a distance, they look like orb-like openings to outer space, and in a sense that’s exactly what they are. These are entry points to the Physical Universe’s wildspace systems. As you approach the orb, the silvery mist of the astral plane will slowly give way to the endless expanse of space.

Maps

  • Astral Plane
Alternative Name(s)
Astral Sea
Type
Plane of Existence
Location under

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